The financial markets were changing in ways even professionals did not fully understand. Their new ability to move at computer, rather than human, speed had given rise to a new class of Wall Street traders, engaged in new kinds of trading.

The line was more valuable the fewer people that had access to it. The whole point of the line was to create inside the public markets a private space, accessible only to those willing to pay tens of millions of dollars in entry fees.

It happens on such a granular level that even if you tried to line it up and figure it out you wouldn’t be able to do it. People are getting screwed because they can’t imagine a microsecond.

The U.S. stock market was now a class system, rooted in speed, of haves and have-nots…The haves enjoyed a perfect view of the market...